


and what if i could've saved you

by ammunitionist



Category: 1917 (Movie 2019)
Genre: Could Be Canon, M/M, Post-Canon, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Yearning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-19
Updated: 2020-01-19
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:53:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22312804
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ammunitionist/pseuds/ammunitionist
Summary: schofield took one of blake's rings with him.it doesn't save him, but it helps.
Relationships: Lance Corporal Schofield/ Lance Corporal Blake, Will Schofield/ Tom Blake, William Schofield/ Thomas Blake
Comments: 16
Kudos: 143





	and what if i could've saved you

it's probably because of the ring.

completing his hellish mission on april 6th meant that schofield was granted an immediate rotation home. he didn't want it, he said so too, but between his injuries and heroism he stood no chance of arguing.

will schofield is on a boat home before he can fully scrub blake's blood out of his cuticles.

with a new, shiny ribbon, too.

he doesn't get rid of it. every time he goes to trade, sell or toss it he can hear blake's indignant voice declaring _"I wouldn't toss it! I'd bring it home to my family!"_.

if only he had known how soon his death would follow after that. schofield doesn't like to dwell on how short that time had seemed. he focuses on the ocean, the quiet chatter behind him, and his crisp new uniform.

in his pocket are three things.

first, a bitterly folded certificate of leave, signed by the general himself.

second, a bent letter, addressed to mrs. blake. it was cheaper and easier to mail news home from home.

third, a ring.

when schofield had handed blake's brother, the other blake, the blake that looked just like him but a bit older, all of tom's jewelry, he had knocked a single gold ring back into the palm of his hand and slipped it into his pocket once more.

it wasn't greed. he didn't need the money.

he isn't sure what it was.

in his pocket, schofield traces the outline of it.

blake was stupid to wear rings, really.

if he had been under fire and shot back for too long, it would have heated up and burned the skin of his knuckle.

it could get caught on wire, parts of his uniform, shrapnel.

it could attract unwanted attention. leave the wrong impression.

scavengers and deserters cut the fingers off to get the rings from the bloated digits of corpses, which- not that blake would care, not now- was just plain humiliating.

schofield supposed he was sort of a scavenger as well.

putting his life back together was hard, after blake died and he narrowly stopped the attack by the devons.

for the first few weeks, feverish dreams kept him from sleeping more than a few hours at a time. it all blurs together and he's left confused, disoriented, and swearing off the wetness on his cheeks as sweat.

they're mostly about blake.

about hands pulling him from chalky, suffocating rubble. about stupid jokes and clumsy navigation. sincerity and candor.

they're about blood.

in some of them, blake and schofield are back in that farm, somewhere between the german trenches and ecoust.

sometimes, it's the shelled out skeleton that it was when they got there.

other times, it's a black crater.

sometimes, they're in the german trenches. sometimes, they're in ecoust. sometimes, they're in the bleach-white trenches of the front.

always, blake is dying.

and always, schofield can't save him.

there is one dream he doesn't think about. he refuses to think about. it's just a blurring of time, he tells himself, a fever-driven smear of trauma.

it's when he stopped in ecoust. when he discovered the young woman hiding, with the baby, about the woozy blur of what he later found out was a concussion.

the hands on his head aren't the woman's.

the gentle press of cloth to his blood-soaked scalp isn't her. the flat, cool palm on his cheek isn't her. the face close to his isn't her.

it's thomas.

it's the youthful, pink-lipped, apologetically concerned face of lance corporal blake.

his breath, soft on schofield's cheek and neck. he's alive, clean, unharmed, and he's healing will in a way that he can't bear to acknowledge he desires.

the fire stains his skin golden. blue eyes stick out like small searchlamps. blake leans too close and gives him breath.

william just holds his lapel with a disbelieving hand and prays to god that it's real this time.

it isn't, of course.

schofield's fingers trace the ring in his pocket. he slips it onto his fourth finger.

he looks out at the endless carpet of ocean.

it isn't real.

it isn't real and schofield is almost home.

**Author's Note:**

> hey thank you for reading! i finished 1917 earlier today and let me tell you there was so much untapped homoeroticism that i came home and immediately wrote this.
> 
> comments appreciated!


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